Reviews

Daniel Radcliffe has definitely grown up from his days as Harry Potter but I question whether he had grown up enough for this role.

The film is very good on the whole and is very much the sort of horror film I enjoy, lots of things to make one jump but without the boring and unnecessary gore.

I think that the scares were well placed and sustained, with good timing but they would all have worked just as well with any other actor.

It cannot be denied that Dan is a good actor but I did not think he was ready for this role; he does not yet appear to have the emotional depth or maturity and probably not enough experience of life to play the part of a young widower with small boy very convincingly at least not yet, and this film could have been so much better with a more mature actor.

A good effort but he is trying to run before he can walk.

This has to be the worst of the three (two being the best). It is over long and choppy. A good editor was obviously not employed or employed and then not allowed to do his job - considering the content (or lack there of) this film was far too long.

Although I was never much of a spider-man comic book reader I do remember a lot of other the other comic book heroes and their stories and some of the stories were real corkers.

The special effects were very good but when will Hollywood realise that good special effects on their own do not make a good film – even a comic book film – and they are no substitute for a good story! I saw Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst being interviewed on television recently and it was one of the most boring interviews I have seen in a long time – the interviewer realising this tried his best to liven things up but to no avail. I don't really care about this and I only mention it now because the performance of Kirsten Dunst in this film is, unfortunately, as flat and as dead as that interview.

The scale is immense, the cinematography is absolutely stunning, the bright colours of the palace and the dark drab colours outside the palace superb, the feeling of claustrophobia and inescapable doom is completely tangible – I thought the relentless calling of the hours an excellent touch, the action very good (though I have to say that that sort of action now hold no surprises for me but it was, at the very least, up to par). The acting was extremely good – I am a huge Chow Yun-Fat fat but I thought all the cast were very good and played their multidimensional characters (probably the lurking, petulant Prince Yu - played by Qin Junjie – was the weakest).

What let it down for me were all the plot loopholes and loose strings – not that I object to a film leaving you wondering why? Or what happened next? However there appeared to me (and to my friends) too much of the background that was not explained (I don't want to go into details as I don't want to spoil anything for anyone who hasn't seen the film yet).

On the whole though a very good film.

Scenes of a Sexual Nature is a very intelligent and subtle film. It is skilfully crafted, beautifully shot and with superb acting. Only the most jaded and cynical could fail to appreciate this film – the best film I have seen so far this year.

It is film that has many twists and turns, some more obvious than others, but even the obvious twists are still enjoyable. Not a lot happens in the film, the pace is slow and meandering but not so slow that ones interest is lost and it never becomes dull. The film examines the minutia of various relationships with great tenderness and wit and like they say the Devil is in the detail. It is the small things that give meaning – relationships are more often damned or celebrated because of the minutia rather than the big gestures. It is the day-to-day content that either holds relationships together or tares them apart.

This film, which in turn is offers us charm, humour, sadness and pathos, offers no great thrills, shocks or drama (one can't help wondering how many people did not see this film at the cinema because of the title or in deed how many went because of the title and were disappointed not to find what they thought they would) nor any great love story, it is not a film that paints large – more like a small water colour but like some water colours it is non-the-less beautifully painted.

All who took part are to be commended.

It is very rare for me to laugh out loud when I watch something on my own (which is a very different experience from watching a comic drama with others), and despite being very tired last night I laughed out loud a lot and thoroughly enjoyed the DVD.

Julie Walters sparkles as always both as the hunchbacked crone Mrs Overall and as the pretentious, self-absorbed actress Bo Beaumont. Celia Imrie and Duncan Preston, both also cast member from the original Acorn Antique TV sketches were also excellent.

Josie Lawrence was a welcome addition I have only seen her perform on the improvisational comedy game show "Whose Line is it Anyway" but continue to be impressed by her as I was by Neil Morrissey – both as the pompous John and the slimy Tony.

However it is Victoria Woods writing which has to be the star of the show. It is so full of wit and irony and self-effacing sarcasm.

A wonderful show which I thoroughly enjoyed – I only wish I had seen it on stage in the West End!

I have never been frightened by gore but can be made to jump by something as simple as a door banging (The Others and The Bone Collector for example). The mind can conjure up images which are far more frightening that anything ever seen on film and if the mind is nudged along a certain path and given suggestions then it is more than capable in filling in the gaps and creating dark and scary landscapes to get lost in.

This film slowly peals away layers of normality so that it is all too easy to accept what is portrayed (or rather for most of the time hinted at) and as the layers are pealed away so more and more suspense is loaded upon the viewer.

It is an extremely well crafted film (in every area: the script, the direction, the cinema photography, the acting and the music score) and personally one of my favourites and in my opinion certainly one of the best of its kind. It shows that sometime more (a lot more) can be achieved by leaving things out rather than putting them in and those directors who carry on insisting to load their films with tomatoes ketchup would do well to sit down and really study this film.

An extremely enjoyable film, which highlighted some of the absurdities of the times - "no need to worry we're getting the barber in" and that it was OK to die for your country but heaven fore fend if you saw naked flesh and especially not moving naked flesh. However this film is also a film of genuine warmth and wit.

It is no surprise that Judie Dench is a true delight, and she certainly sparkles as someone who is herself a human of warmth and wit. It was also good to see Thelma Barlow on the screen once more. Kelly Reilly is perfect in the role of Maureen. The real surprise is Will Young, one didn't expect singer of real talent to come from a TV pop contest but most singers who try to cross over into acting fail abysmally but Will Young shows that he might have real talent in this area as well.